Page 107 of Guarded King

ROMAN

My pounding footsteps are loud in the small room and drops of sweat sting my eyes. I’ve been running on the treadmill for thirty minutes, and yet the burn in my chest is still stronger than the burn in my muscles.

I slam my fist on the stop button and slow to a walk, staring out at Manhattan lit up in front of me.

Somewhere out there, among the millions of faceless people, Chloe is having dinner with another man.

I should be happy about it. She’s done everything I wanted. Since the minute we stepped off that plane and back on US soil, we’ve acted as if we never kissed, never touched. Never fucked.

But we have. And no matter how hard I try, I can’t get it—can’t gether—out of my head. She’s burrowed under my skin in a way I thought was impossible for any woman to do. Even when I was with Katherine, I wasn’t obsessed with her the way I am with Chloe.

It’s possible I wasn’t obsessed with her at all.

While it’s pure torture seeing Chloe in my office every day and reliving those memories, she’s returned to the efficient, professional assistant I’ve come to rely on over the last few months. Of course she has. She’s more than proven howseriously she takes her job. She wouldn’t let what we shared compromise that.

But I don’t like it.

In fact, I fucking hate it.

For a short time—far too short—she let herself go with me. She asked for what she wanted and trusted me to give it to her. She bared herself to me and it was breathtaking.

But she needs a man who can be there when she needs him. Who can give her what she wants and needs when she’s too busy to take them for herself.

And I can’t be that man. I can’t make a woman my priority when the King Group will always come first. Especially when that woman is my employee and the eyes of the business world are on me, waiting for me to slip up.

Despite all that, the voice of reason in my head is drowned out by the possessive anger that churns in my chest at the thought of another man experiencing what I did.

Stepping off the treadmill, I snag the towel hanging on the back of the leg press machine and scrub it over my face and hair.

I stalk to my shower and turn it on full force. While I wait for the water to heat, I shuck my soaked workout clothing, then step under the spray, hoping to god the scalding water will wash away these feelings I can’t seem to shake.

But when I close my eyes, all I can see is Chloe smiling at that asshole, laughing with him. Will he try to take her home with him tonight? Will she let him?

I brace my hands against the shower wall and hang my head, heart pounding and jealousy scouring my veins.

Ethan is a good man. I know because I looked into him after I overheard her accepting his invitation to dinner, figuring if I could reassure myself she was going out with someone decent, these feelings would go away.

They haven’t.

He might be a nice fucking guy, but he isn’t the right man for her.

I am.

My breaths saw in and out of my lungs painfully, my control hanging by a thread. My brain, clearly working against me, conjures an image that pushes me straight to the edge.

Ethan taking Chloe back to his house, undressing her, touching her soft skin, stroking over her inner thigh. Over the mark I left on her.

Is it still there? Or has it faded to nothing in the week and a half since I gave it to her as she came?

A raw possessiveness seizes me by the throat, and this time I give in and let it take me over.

Chloe is mine.

Mine to look after. Mine to take care of. Her needs are mine to fulfill. I don’t know how I’ll make it work when she’s still my assistant. And there’s no way in hell I’ll fire her or ask her to quit her job. But I can’t stand by and let some other man have her because I wasn’t prepared to put in the effort.

Icy determination replaces the fire in my veins as I turn the shower off. I’ve barely dried myself before I message Phillip to meet me downstairs. Once I’m dressed, I stare at myself in the mirror. There’s no uncertainty in my expression. No doubt in my mind.

Confidently, I stride from my bedroom to the elevator.

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